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Papers, photographs and maps of a wealthy Morgantown family with interests in real estate and coal mining. Most of the business papers are those of J. M. G. Brown, a West Virginia University law school alumnus, who was president of Scotts Run Fuel Corporation. Brown was also a housing developer whose company, Suburban Real Estate of Morgantown, was a competitive concern not only locally but throughout north central West Virginia and southwest Pennsylvania. There are papers indicating his attempts to open Morgantown to airline service. His sister, Mary Virginia Brown was a genealogist and local historian noted for A History of the Negroes of Monongalia County. Among her papers are genealogies of the Bannister, Brown, Bushey, Dorsey, Suter and Williams families. There are also original documents of Colonel William McCleary, an early settler of Morgantown. There is also a manuscript "List of Taxable Property for 1786, Monongalia County," including five pages listing residents and their "tithables," horses, and cattle.

Manuscript diary of David R. Preston, Presbyterian minister and missionary assigned to Pensacola, Florida, and St. Charles, Missouri, 1828-1829, containing information on the number of missionaries and regularly assigned ministers of the Presbyterian, Methodist, and Episcopal churches in the areas, the number of church services held, attendance and interest of the congregations, organization of Bible classes, and Sunday schools. Preston also preached to black congregations and comments on their attendance and attitude. There is comment on the Roman Catholic Church, its activities, means to combat its influence, and its social and business life. Preston also held services in the Escambia River area of Alabama. Names of people living in the areas are given as well as descriptions of land and business enterprises, and opinions concerning future settlement and economic development. The names of U.S. Navy ships in the Pensacola harbor are mentioned with comments on the officers, condition of the ships, and discipline maintained. Conditions and cost of travel by stage and boat are commented on with accounts of Preston's journeys from Philadelphia to Pensacola, and from Pensacola to St. Charles.

Minutes of the church, 1817-1910, and of the Parkersburg Baptist Association, 1819-1869. Lists and reports of member churches, including Hughes River, Marietta, Bethesda, Sampson Creek, Mount Zion, Reedy Creek, and Elizabeth. Lists of early members (white and black) of the First Baptist Church 1817-1844. An historical sketch of the Parkersburg Baptist Association written by Rev. J.W. Carter in 1869, with a statistical report on member churches 1818-1869.

Papers regarding West Virginia statehood and the history of Wheeling and Ohio County compiled by Judge Gibson L. Cranmer (1826-1903) of Wheeling, West Virginia, who served as secretary of the Wheeling Convention that repudiated Virginia's secession from the United States in 1861. Series 1 includes manuscript narratives and correspondence describing events of the West Virginia statehood movement, written by eyewitnesses at the request of Gibson L. Cranmer. Manuscript authors include John S. Burdett, John S. Carlile, Daniel Frost, Lewis Ruffner, and Benjamin Wilson. Series 2 includes Cranmer's handwritten notes, drafts of articles, copies of documents, and letters solicited by him regarding the history of Wheeling and Ohio County, West Virginia. See Scope and Content Note for details and contents list.

Pamphlets include Henry Ruffner's antislavery pamphlet, 1847, and his Union speech, 1856. Subjects of the manuscripts and correspondence include family history; travel; Kanawha Salt Works; schools in Virginia and Kanawha County; Lane Seminary Library; Presbyterian Church; slavery, coal, gas, iron, and timber; Johns Hopkins, Washington and Lee, Harvard, Hobart, Cornell, and Hampden-Sydney colleges; Greenbrier County; Alabama; election of 1904; University of Virginia; Kanawha Valley floods; Venezuela; American Colonization Society; and the Philippine Islands. Persons mentioned or commented on include Philip Doddridge, John Letcher, Hugh Mercer, and Nelson A. Miles. Correspondents include Charles H. Ambler, John Eaton, John P. Hale, H.R. Helper, W.S. Laidley, David L. Ruffner, John W. Wayland, and William L. Wilson.

Transcript of an interview by Richard Hadsell with Major W.P. Tams, Jr., former mine operator in the Winding Gulf coal mining region. Tams discusses his early days in coal mining, the opening of the Kanawha coal region, and coal operators and union officials such as: E.J. Berwind, Joe Beury, George Collins, Jarius Collins, Justus Collins, John J. Cornwell, Samuel Dixon, Elias Hatfield, Troy Hatfield, Isaac Mann, S.T. Patterson, J.A. Renahan, James O. Watts, and George Wolfe. Other individuals mentioned include: Henry D. Hatfield, John L. Lewis, John Mitchell, Fred Mooney, Bob Patterson, and "Mother" Mary Jones. Tams also discusses the Winding Gulf Collieries, the Beaver Coal Co., the Smokeless Coal Field, the N&W Railroad, the C&O Railroad, the Virginian Railroad, Baldwin-Felts Detective Agency, unions and strikes, racial relations, blacks, scrip, company stores, Atwater, and Castner, Curran and Bullitt.

County court records concerning court cases and proceedings, as well as some public records, primarily tax, birth, death, and marriage records. There is also a large collection of private account books from various local businesses.